Police said the scam involves someone contacting businesses and claiming to be from NStar or another electric company billing department. The scammer tells customers that their power will be turned off if they don’t pay their bill by midnight.

The customers are instructed to pay by buying a Green Dot Visa card, and then told to call another phone number to provide the information from the card for payment.

The Green Dot cards are also known as MoneyPak cards and are typically sold at convenience stores. People buy a card and pay money to put cash onto the card.

Police say companies such as NStar will not ever ask for this type of payment.

Police ask that if anyone receives such a call to contact their local police departments.